Homemade Wooden Blocks

I love trees. We planted one the year our daughter was born and will again soon for our son. I like what they symbolize: growth and stability and keeping yourself grounded. So when I saw these wooden blocks for sale made from pieces of a tree, I thought they would be a great purchase for my little man. 

Then the tree that has been in my grandparents’ yard for years lost some branches and I saved some to repurpose and make my own. The tree at my Grandma’s house has been there as long as I can remember- we’ve played around it, took a million pictures by it as it was the unofficial photo spot of the backyard and watched it grow.

So I scraped off the bark, sanded the pieces smooth and put a coat of non-toxic stain on them:

~Angela

Gingerbread house

I've never had good luck building gingerbread houses... This year I bought a kit that had slots for the base so I was thinking the added stability and less stress building would mean more time decorating.

It started off well:







With the walls in place, we decorated the roof:









Assembly from there did not go well:



As I was trying to reconstruct the dilapidated gingerbread house I realized my daughter was eating the building materials (frosting) right from the package.












We got back on track and just decorated the pieces and gave up on assembly after I discovered a bite out of the roof.



I had visions of an award winning gingerbread house, and really would have been fine with one that at least stood in its own, but instead we had good memories- and a sweet snack.

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An attitude of gratitude

We used the tree of giving thanks that my mom and I made for the first time as a family this year.






Each day in November we took turns writing what we were thankful for. My daughter loved this activity and as a new writer, contributed more than Daddy or me. She is also a pro at writing her name so that made up a good portion of her contributions:) It appears we were more thankful for her than anyone/anything else.






I saved all of our thankful cards and we can read through them in years to come, just as we did at the end of the month. My daughter didn't choose to be thankful for things like toys, but people (such as herself), including her little brother- proud parenting moment here.













Our thanks included some light hearted and some serious, but topping the list is our health and our family. If you have these two things, you have everything. It's amazing how when we take the time to be thankful for what we have, we worry less, complain less and love deeper.

Then I saw this in a book I was reading:


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Picnic nook

We like to eat outside on our patio and do as often as possible. But we don’t have much shade there, so I wanted to clear out a spot in the woods behind our house that we could picnic in. We are lucky to have woods behind our house even though we live right in town. I removed small trees/weeds and planted grass seed, then hung some solar lights.




Sometimes we just bring our picnic blanket out there and eat, but I recently found a table at a garage sale that I repainted and added to the spot.




I love this picnic nook!
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Bloom: A Tutorial

I have mentioned before that I like to change out my decor frequently so I am hesitant to spend a lot of money on accessories unless I know I will have it forever. I found this 12 X 12 simple frame at Michaels for $14.99 (plus I had a 40% off coupon so it was even cheaper!!) and put it in my entry. I thought I could change what is in the frame periodically and easily, but right now I am in spring mode.

Here is how I made the sign:

I had these letters on hand, leftover from a scrapbooking project. There were no vowels left in the set, so it was great to use up the leftover odd letters.

I used spray adhesive and glitter to cover the red letters so they would match the pink scrapbook paper I was using as sa background.

I glued on flowers and a button in place of the letters. This took the longest - deciding which two buttons to use.

This project literally took me 10 minutes to make. I love projects like this (quick, easy and finished product is just as expected).

~Angela

Wedding Vows displayed

Since my husband and I wrote our own wedding vows, I've been trying to think for years (we've been married over 7 years, so it's about time I figured something out!) of a way to preserve them and display them so we can see them on a daily basis. I still mean every word of the vows I wrote today and they are a reminder of what is important.









I used picmonkey which is a free online tool to upload a photos, then completely whited out the photos so I could type the text onto the white background. Then I saved the file as a .jpg to my computer to uploaded to Walgreens.com and had the vows printed on canvas. Walgreens also framed the canvases for me. I LOVE how they turned out.




I love seeing these every day.  And I still mean every word of those vows.
~Angela

Big girl room

This project has literally been in the works for months! The project really got pushed aside when I lost all my energy in the first trimester of my pregnancy. I am still not at 100% energy, but the project is complete! My husband helped out a lot too, once we realized I was pregnant and should not be painting. We cannot be happier with how the room turned out and it truly is a labor of love. Not a lot of money was spent in the room because so many things were repurposed, but a lot of time and energy went into it. The curtains were the big splurge from West Elm and as a general rule, I am not a fan of curtains. This is the only room in our house that has curtains. My husband jokes that I must have been pregnant and nesting to decide to purchase those, but they really add to the room.








The walls are a gray with glitter paint on top. It doesn’t show up well in photos, but I really like the effect. The bed has been in my family forever. It was once at my grandma’s, then my mom’s, then I inherited it. I painted it (ok, my husband did the painting) white and sanded off the paint for a rustic look.




I got the nightstand from a garage sale for $1. It had a tacky checkerboard painted on the top, but I painted and sanded this to match the bed. The ceramic tractor was a gift from our little girl’s friend. He painted it for her and she keeps it close to her bed because sometimes she likes to sleep with it.




The bookshelf was a gift to my little girl last year for Christmas. I made it in my woodworking class. We moved it up from the basement.




I made the signs using picmonkey to reflect what I say to my little girl every night and had them printed at our local UPS store for $.85/each. I put them in repainted frames that were in our master bedroom when I redecorated that room.








And the teepee…my fave part of the room. Since the closet in this bedroom takes up one whole wall and has plenty of storage, we could justify the loss of space that would otherwise have a dresser there. I was looking to buy a teepee online and figured I could make it for less than the $150-200 they sell for. We bought (6) 1 X 2 boards for $.79/each and drilled holes in them and tied them together. Then I bought a king size flat sheet ($15) to wrap around the teepee.




Our little girl wasted no time moving “just her favorite” books in here and reading. My husband and I also fell asleep in there…it was a cozy place to nap:)




Our little girl LOVES the room so much that it is all worth it! We did not have to worry about the transition to a big girl room for her being difficult; she was so excited to sleep in there, she asked to sleep in her new room when the only thing in the room was the bed and piles of randomness on the floor and it was far from finished! And much to her delight, every single person that comes over happily agrees to look at her new room when she excitedly asks them. Bless their hearts...
Now the nursery awaits its latest occupant- our baby that is due in October.
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Using hangers to display photos

Being that I take thousands of photos, I am always looking for unique ways to display them, like when I hung photos from a branch here. I mentioned before I don't mind doing laundry and spend a decent amount of time in my laundry room, tending to laundry, making my own laundry soap and repairing clothes. I decided to add some personalization to the room with pictures of my little girl.  I had taken these fun pictures when we were out puddling last summer and found inspiration here. I found these antique hangers at a thrift store and mounted the 8 X10 photos to mdf that I cut to size. Then I used Mod Podge to adhere the photos to the mdf.

Clip them in a hanger (mine were purchased from a thrift store), hang with 3m Command Strips- done!
~Angela

Roads from painters tape

As is often the case, the best laid plans don’t always go as planned, but we try to roll with them around here. I had the day off of work and planned to send my little girl to daycare as usual, so I could focus on painting her big girl room (I anticipated this to be much easier when she is not around, trying to be a “helper.”) Then, I was getting a massage. Painting always makes me hurt in muscles I forget I have.

My little girl woke up and her fever put a spin on that day to myself. I kept her home and instead we stayed in our pajamas, cuddled, we colored and we made reading corners.

We played with toys, pulling every last one out of the toy basket, rediscovering past favorites and settling in to play with a constant favorite of hers- cars.

I looked at the painting supplies and tucked them away for another day, when I had an idea with the painters tape- I could make road for her cars! So I made random roads, bridges, and intersections. I even made a weird shaped parking lot. I figured since the tape comes off the wood trim with no problem, it would not hurt our hardwood floors.






This was such a hit! We had so much fun together with this! She spent hours playing with these roads and we left them up for several days. And as suspected, the tape came off the floors, no problem!

What a fabulous day off after all:)

~Angela

Paper Heart (Easy project for kids)

 

Supplies: 

-12 x 12 cardstock

-Glue dots

-Heart paper punch

-scraps of colored/designed paper or paint chips

  

 1. Cut out hearts from the paper scraps or paint chips. (I used paint chips because I had a ton of them)

 

 2. Place a glue dot on the back of each heart and adhere to the cardstock, either in a pattern or randomly. (I intended for mine to be roughly an inch apart and did put a pencil mark at each inch, for my helper to follow as a guideline).

 My helped had to make some final adjustments:

 

 

 Viola!



I like the texture so nixed the glass when I put it in a frame to display in my entry.

~Angela